(gentle music) - Welcome friends to this episode of the Everyday Educator podcast. I'm your host, Lisa Bailey, and I am excited to spend some time with you today as we encourage one another, learn together, and ponder the delights and challenges that make homeschooling the adventure of a lifetime. Whether you're just considering this homeschooling possibility or deep into the daily delight of family learning, I believe you'll enjoy thinking along with us.

But don't forget, although this online community is awesome, you'll find even closer support in a local CC community. So go to classicalconversations.com and find a community near you today. Well, listeners, I have a treat for you, and actually it's a treat for me too. I have with me today, Amy Jones.

Amy and I talked several weeks ago about finding wonder, especially as we begin this new school year with our children at home. How can we do more to find wonder in the world that God has given us? And how can we bring that wonder into our families and into our schooling?

And Amy and I didn't get finished talking. So I invited Amy to come back today, and we are gonna talk about finding wonder. And so I put out the podcast as putting on your wonder hat, because that's something that Amy encouraged me to do as we prepared to talk together again.

This is just gonna be an hour of encouraging you. And specifically, we are, as we go, gonna look at how do we find wonder with our youngest children? And we're gonna talk to you a little bit about how you could use the Scribblers resource, the brand new Scribblers at Home recipes from Lifelong Learners resource, not just with your littlest learners, but with your whole family.

And it can be a real tool for finding wonder in your day. So Amy, thank you so much for agreeing to talk with me about this again. - Oh, thanks, Lisa. This is one of the most delightful things I do for my day, is to contemplate wonder. - And you're so good at it.

Every time I talk to you about how to find wonder, for our families and our homeschooling journey, what I discover, Amy, I'll be really honest, is a new way that God is calling me, Grandma, to find wonder in my everyday world so that I can connect with Him. And so moms and dads who are listening to this podcast, we're not encouraging you to find wonder just so you can show it to your children, so that you can find wonder that ministers to your soul, that draws you back into deep fellowship with the Lord.

So hey, maybe it'll be just kind of like a revival for all of us today as we explore this. I wanna ask you first though, Amy, how can we encourage wonder in our families? What can we do every day to chase the wonder? - Oh, that's such a great question.

I really love the way the Scribblers lays out that play, pray, read, explore, serve, because it's not just for, it's just like you said, it's not just for our children, that the rhythm of our day and recognizing in that rhythm God's presence and having that awareness, I was just reminded that the scriptures, like the Psalm about the heavens declaring the glory of God and Romans telling us that He reveals His divine nature and eternal power and through the creation.

Those texts were written for adults. They weren't written for little children to discover. They're written for us because God knows that we respond to beauty and that beauty and wonder draws us into relationship with Him. So I would say that the way that we can incorporate wonder is the awareness of God's presence and how He reveals Himself.

And I know the natural world is a calling card, that's really, we walk outside and He's, the beauty of His world wherever we are just reminds us of Himself, but also just in the everyday rhythms of our home as we incorporate praying and even the idea of playing, of just being open to God's presence in our home.

And I think it really does start with where our minds go. If they, if Philippians tells us to think on these things and they're not things like worry or prayer, they're things that are lovely and praiseworthy. And I think just having that, beginning that habit of drawing my mind to a higher thing, to recognizing God's presence, that's one of those rhythms that we can incorporate.

And I think that we, in scribblers, it describes, let's pray every day, play every day, read every day, explore every day, serve every day, that I guarantee that if we as adults incorporate those things, that it would open us up to an understanding of God that we don't really experience in my head down, get to the next thing sort of day.

So I think it's just, for me, it's a real attitude, an intentional attitude of the heart. And it's also incorporating rhythms in my day that are kind of reminders, like a little tap on the shoulder of God is here, God is present here and look for Him. - I love what you just said, because I think it speaks to how we all homeschool, especially at the beginning of a year, that we have so much on our plate and so many good things on our list of to-dos that we start every day, hit the ground running, and we're just moving from thing to thing.

And in our mind, that is a good thing because we are cramming so much good stuff into every day. But your call to us to maybe change our rhythm to a more restful rhythm. I wrote down plan rest into your day. So maybe get your list of all these things and take, I don't know, 50% of it off the table so that you can develop a rhythm that is governed by smaller principles.

Like the scribblers pray, play, read, explore, and serve, things that allow you to slow down and develop a more restful attitude so that you have time to look around and see what it is that God has brought into your orbit today, instead of blowing past 10 good things to get to the good thing that you put on your list.

I wonder, I was gonna ask you if you think there are any prerequisites for finding wonder, because I thought of one that I might write down, but I wanted to ask you, do you think there are any prerequisites for us to finding wonder? Oh yeah, I do, because I think it's our anticipation that God is present, that He's here.

I think recognizing that, wow, God is present with me and He has something for me today. And what I recognize about in our relationship with God is that He always treats me like a human being. He doesn't treat me like a human doing. He doesn't give me those lists.

He really calls to rest, and that really is an act of faith, Lisa, isn't it? We have to kind of turn our back on the way the world measures, or even success, or the way the world expresses value. It does kind of express the value of being a human.

It expresses value of always the outcome. There's this franticness of activity that supposedly brings about a meaning in your life, and some people measure their life by how frantically busy they are. They must be accomplishing things, and that's very worldly. And with the Lord, He says, "Wait on me, wait.

"Be still, acknowledge me, and rest." And that's a real act of faith. But a prerequisite to me is just a natural curiosity of the world and a willingness to poke around and ask, what, why, how does that work? (laughs) - Yes, yes, that is a great prerequisite. I was thinking that one of the prerequisites to wonder is allowing yourself and your family time to contemplate.

It's just being still. Because when you're not still, like you said, when you're just rushing and on to the next thing, you're not being still enough, you're not waiting for God to show you something. So I would agree that the prerequisites for finding wonder are being still and being curious.

I like that, I like that a lot. So let me ask you this, I do wanna, we are going to dive into a Scribbler activity and look specifically at how that will take us as families toward finding wonder. But I wanted to ask you, we talk so much in classical conversations about the value of a classical Christian community that I wanted to ask you about those attributes.

How does a classical education promote wonder? - Oh yes, I feel like I've learned so much from being in classical conversations. It's just sort of opened my understanding to the beauty of classical education, even though we know it's not, quote, Christian, but it very much is a natural reflection of humanness.

And I think those questions, Lisa, are probably the tools, those classical tools of those five common topics and those core habits of grammar, and they're in the Scribbler's Guide, so you're right there, they're in the catalog, they're so available. But I find that wonder starts with questions, but not just any question.

I feel like what the classical education does is it gives us good questions to ask. That's where those tools come in. So when you're asking even simple questions like what do you see, what do you hear, just helping them recognize, our children recognize, wait, that requires stopping and achieving.

And then incorporating that into what's the definite, what is this thing, what is it not? I remember reading that for the first time and thinking that is brilliant, because so many things we define in those terms, this is what a flower is, it's not a tree, and that we naturally move to comparison.

And those tools, those classical tools give us ways of looking at the world and helping us discern how to learn about the world. It's like a connector of questions to me help guide my thinking, but they also help guide my children's thinking, where it's not just random and they're never yes and no answered questions, they're probing, they're probing questions.

And I just, I love that. It really has been, for my life with CC, it has been phenomenal in the way I think. It's just, it's a form that I can follow that helps me begin to understand something that I didn't know before, and it helps my children. I'm not fumbling around, so that is probably the most helpful that I've found.

- I love it, I love the whole, the classical model of grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric is so beautiful. And you think, well, what does that have to do with wonder? I think what you said, asking all those good questions, what do you see, what do you hear, what is this thing, what is this thing not, is it like, what's it like, what is it, how is it different, all those good grammar, those are good, building the knowledge, building the knowledge of that thing allows us to just kind of explore the ooh, that's so cool aspect of it, but then the dialectic, where you're asked, where you are comparing it, and you are seeing what it will do, and what it doesn't do, and how does it behave, and where did I find it, and putting all those pieces together, the dialectic that is designed to help us think more deeply about that thing is awesome, but then the rhetoric, to me, is where the celebration comes in.

It's like, wow, God has revealed this to me, and I have explored it, and I have actually come to understand God a little bit more, or realize that I'll never understand God all the way, and isn't that amazing, but just to celebrate. So for me, that classical model of grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric really does promote wonder, and the best part is that celebration of wow, we serve an amazing God who clearly was way more creative than I'll ever be, and who gave us a world of light, and color, and beauty, when it could all have just been functional, and grayscale.

You know, that really promotes wonder. Well, let me ask you this. How does a Christian education promote wonder? - Oh, you know, it's what it's all about. It's just what you said, that at every turn, God uses his creation to point to even greater majesty of himself. Every work brings us into worship.

I find that if I, even simple things like going outside, and look, the moon right now has just been so beautiful. - Oh, yes, yes! - And I look at that, and I think, the Lord, you made this rhythm of these, you know, it's full, it's new, and it marks time, and it's a mystery to me still.

And yet, you put that in the sky for me to think about. It reminds me of his sovereignty over creation, his trustworthiness, his faithfulness. It's never, we're never gonna go outside, and the moon just disappears today, and it's gonna go up to mark. It's never like that. He gives us that security of our world, of that predictability as a reflection of his faithfulness.

I, it just, it always brings me to higher thoughts about him. - I think it is so cool that God uses the beauty of creation to woo us. He is using it to woo us, and for our children, when they see how beautiful it is, or how tiny something is, or how complex it is, it woos them, and we can lead them to think how great a God we serve.

It woos us into relationship. - Exactly, that's a beautiful way to put it, yes. - I just think that's the coolest. And you know, the only way that we'll ever see what was intended by the world is to get to know the author. I mean, the author, the creator is the only one who knows what he intended, what message he intended to send when he created this world.

And so the only way for us to get to the bottom of our curiosity is to get to know the Lord. And so it's such a great circle where he woos us because he loves us, because he wants us to know him. - It's remarkable. I mean, it's so humbling, isn't it?

It's just the thing, no one will ever pursue me that way. And as much as others love me, they will never pursue me in love that way. It is, yeah, it's beyond me. - I think that that's a beautiful thing to transmit to our children, how deeply God loves you and how much he wants you to know him.

So let me ask you this, how does or how might community promote wonder? - Oh, that's a great question. I think that if in my own CC community, I believe that because there's this gaggle of people that are like-minded and we all love the Lord in our own ways, that just rubbing shoulders with people who are different and have different wonders.

And I think that that just expands my understanding of God. Someone, we had a director who just was phenomenal at understanding geography. And she just, I would just look at rocks. I mean, I'm confessing here and go, "That's a rock." - Yeah, it's brown, it's another brown rock. - But after spending time with Hannah, our director, she just opened up this world of beauty that God has hidden in rocks and strata.

I mean, she could explain things. So just being around other people that have their own recipe of wonder, so to speak, they have something in their heart that God has designed that draws them into creation that they can share. And really just the simplest things my granddaughters go to CC here in our community.

And I just love hearing what they're gonna present. You know, the presentations of children help us see again, the wonder of God. One of my granddaughters shared about her, she had a giant praying mantis in a jar. And another one had her favorite, she recited her favorite little poem.

And of course, David brought his Spiderman outfit. They all have a taste of wonder. And I think in community, that's what we can share with each other. And that, I mean, that's the body of Christ. It's really proclaiming his nature to one another and praising him through just that sharing with each other.

Oh, did you know about this? Did you see this? And that's why community is so important. It really builds that in us, doesn't it? And I feel like for our children, my children were very different from me, surprisingly. And they had their own wonders. And so they could find a community with like-minded wanderers, you know, that everyone, oh, this group of people loves insects, you know, and are drawn together.

So I just found community absolutely essential for just for myself, but also just to really encourage my own children to see that there were people that really had proclivities that they matched with them. And that was kind of a neat, that's just an extra, I don't think we promote that.

- Yeah, I know, but it's really true. That's very beautifully presented, Amy. I think, yeah, that that's really true. One of the beauties of community is that we can find kindred spirits. And our children need that because you know what? We're not always the kindred spirit for our child.

Their passion is not always what we're passionate about. And so we can't chase it as well as a friend they may find in community. That's lovely. So you and I have talked about Scribblers before because we worked on Scribblers together, and we've discussed those pillars of a homeschool day that you've already recounted for us.

In Scribblers, we talk about, if you have done these five things every day, it's been a good day. Yep, if you pray together, play together, read together, explore together, and serve together every day, it's been a good day. So how can we embrace wonder as we pray, play, read, explore, and serve?

So I ask Amy to choose one of the Scribblers activities, and I don't know which one she's picked, to choose one of the Scribblers activities and help us see the wonder. So Amy, tell me which one you picked, and I'm gonna look it up in my book. Well, it was really hard to narrow it down.

But I chose a science page 207 called "Turn Over a New Leaf." But I'll tell you, Lisa, when I was going through this a few days ago, I was thinking there is wonder in every one of the strands, because we start off with poetry, and there is such beauty in language that there's a wonder.

Like if we just read the poetry, there are people that find that so beautiful. And of course, history and arithmetic. And I was thinking, I even looked into Latin, I was like, okay, that's me, the true test, right? But I thought here again is the regularity of God, that a language that was spoken hundreds of years ago, I can understand because the commonality of the structure of language, and that's a gift from the Lord.

And here again, every time you uncover this beauty and that he incorporates in all aspects. So it was hard for me. But I thought, okay, I love being outside with the children. And sometimes that was the last thing on my list is to get outside. And I thought this is an invitation.

So, and I love this activity, because anybody can do it if you're just for three year olds or 23 year olds, you can all do it. And it's super simple, because basically, it's going outside and you equip yourself, especially young children love instruments, right? So the purpose of this is to find a tree or a bush is a little tricky, but if you can find a tree that you are going to focus on, and so I would say, grab a towel, and the way you're gonna get some like, I think of scissors and old spoons, and you don't have to buy things.

Get some masking tape. I say if you have a string, like children can handle, that's pretty handy for this activity. And a magnifying glass, just get them to gather things. Oh my goodness, children just love that. And then get in a bag and choose a tree. And then what I loved about this activity is that you look at the tree from three points of view.

You have, you lay on the ground, you, I say, okay, the three points of view is you're gonna look at it from eye level from down on the ground, and then you're gonna, well, ground floor, and then you're gonna look at eye level, and then what I call your head back, looking up.

(laughs) So you're gonna just take some time and around that base of the tree, just what's growing around there? What kind of dirt does it have? Dig up some dirt, put it in a bag, start gathering your specimens around the tree. That's where a masking tape comes in handy.

You can stick it, the sticky side out, you can stick it down on the ground and pull it up and see what you get. And then around the base of the tree, you can stick it around there and pull it out. If you wanna get a piece of bark or look at if you can see the roots, you can kind of take a look at the roots and kind of feel them, just really kind of engage at that level where you're touching things, you're digging things, you're looking at things.

Even if you find dead stuff, stick it in. (laughs) We were always finding dead stuff. And if there's a bug, you might have to talk about if we're gonna bring in the house or not. - Right. (laughs) - But then if you can, then get your child, one of the things that we've done too is just take a piece of string, this is wildlife string, and get them to measure the base of the tree.

Like what is, how big is the trunk? And a string is nice because you can measure around the trunk and then just clip it and then stick it in your bag so you can come inside and measure it because sometimes it's unwieldy to do a tape measure, you know, that-- - I agree, especially for little hands on uneven surfaces.

Yeah, that's good. - You wanna make it really hospitable for them. And then have them stand up and start looking at where their eye level, which is gonna be different than yours, but compare those eye levels. Like they may see lower branches or they may see particular leaves or buds, it depends on what time of year it is, and they can just notice and you can just start helping them compare, like how is this different than what you saw at the base of the tree?

How is this, what do you anticipate? Why do you think things are here? And just start asking those questions of helping them start exploring really what you're gonna do. And one of the places that I find interesting, if you have a low enough tree, it's a look at the branch coming off the trunk and just sort of looking at how is it shaped?

What's this form? What's this pattern? What do you recognize? So getting them to sort of think about, oh, this is interesting because this tree goes up and out and this tree, you know, other trees like Christmas trees, you know, they're just like triangle. So helping them, is this a leaf or is this a pine needle or is this, you know, is this kind of a small shaped leaf or does this look like a maple leaf?

What does this look like? And in this, for this chart that goes with this section is a leaf chart. So you can actually take it outside and get them to say, oh, well, are the leaves arranged? How are they arranged? And what are the parts? It's so cool to get to have some language that you can share with them.

And then I say the head up. I just say, look up, step back, look at the tree. What's the overall shape and get them to draw it. They don't have to be perfect. You know, I can draw a triangle or a big circle, but get them to see the shape.

And then what is their circumstance, so to speak? What's around the tree? Are there other trees? Is it out in the field? Do you see any animals in the trees or have you, is it like birds or a little butterflies? Right now we have butterflies over our trees. So what do you see?

And again, from the big picture and then, and then just come inside and kind of parse out, you know, dump all your specimens and then just sort, you know, what's different, what did we learn? And I would say, you know, asking, well, what did we, and this would usually be something we can start with.

What do we know about trees? And then what do we hope to know? What do we want to discover? Starting that before you go out and kind of anticipating. And then I used to write that down. And then when we came back, hey, did any of these questions get answered for you?

And there was always something that we, yeah, I didn't know. We had, you know, the root system look, you know, look like that, you know, or I didn't know that the trunk was that big around. Sometimes we've been with trunks where two kids would have to like, you know, hold hands.

Hold hands to go around. Yeah, absolutely. But yeah, like that is just a very simple thing you can, activity you can do right outside. And I just find that's your field trip for the day, right? Yes. One of the beautiful things that I think endeavor trips like that, one of the beautiful things that you show your children is when you're outside and exploring and you're just having fun and you're just following your senses wherever they take you.

But when you come back in and think about it and retrace your steps, you realize that all of that observing and testing answered some of your questions. And so that begins from a really early age to teach them, I can learn about the world and that the way that I interact with what God is showing me, how I find the wonder actually helps me know creation better.

And the really wonderful thing is that you can do this with four-year-olds and five-year-olds and 10-year-olds and 12-year-olds and 16-year-olds. But I wanna tell you, Amy, that you can do this with 15-month-olds. Now I know that we did not market scribblers necessarily to 15-month-olds, but one of the joys of my heart is my grandson, Gideon.

And I had the chance yesterday to spend some time with him outside. We were strolling around, walking and walking and walking. And when he was ready to have a deep drink of milk and get out of the stroller for a little while, we were sitting on a bench together and he's a very observant kid.

Of course, I feel like he's the smartest 15-month-old that ever lived. But he was very interested in, there was a bush sitting beside our bench and he kept pointing to the bush and he kept looking at me and then he'd point to the bush. And I said, "Do you want a leaf?" And he kind of nodded.

And so I pulled off one of the leaves and I gave it to him. And he felt it and he traced it with his finger and he crinkled it and he shook it to see if it would make a noise and I showed him how to twirl it. And then he started pointing.

On the ground were some of the leaves that had already fallen off and they were a different color. So we talked about, okay, it's a smooth leaf, it's a green leaf, it came from this tree and I pulled it off. And we talked about in the fall, the leaves will turn brown and they'll fall.

And he pointed to the ground and there's a brown leaf. And so I gave it to him and he held one in each hand and I said, "Okay, so does it feel different?" So he rubbed him and he's 15 months old, he's not telling me things, he's not talking, but he can point and when I say feel it, he would feel it.

And so he twirled both of them and he walked around for a while and then he pointed to another bush that was also green, but it was a different kind of bush. And so I said, "Do you want one of those?" And he nodded and I gave it to him.

I said, "Okay, now it has a sticker on the end. "If you poke your finger with this, it might hurt." So he took the green leaves and he held them out. He actually held one in each hand and he was looking. I said, "Okay, so this one is long.

"This one is big and long and thin "and this one is short and round "with the sticker on the end." And so even a 15 month old can be interested in the world that God's created. And find things to marvel at, the feel of it. And I will say, he did lift it to his lips and he looked at me 'cause we had been singing a song about all the senses and God gave us eyes and nose and fingers.

And so he put it up to his mouth and I said, "No, no, it is not for taste. "It is just for looking and touching." And he was like, "Okay, Lolly, that's fine." But I guess I share that with you because there is wonder even in what you can do with a 15 month old.

It doesn't have to be a verbal child and it can be a child that could write a paragraph about what you're observing. The point, I think, for me, the point is, can we find wonder alongside our children? Will we allow the Lord to woo us with the beauty that he's provided for us into a deeper relationship with him?

And will we make finding wonder the linchpin of our homeschooling for this year? I would love that. Hey, Amy let me know, well, actually, I had not discovered it yet, but Amy discovered something that you guys might really want to know, especially since we've talked about scribblers at home, recipes from lifelong learners.

For this next month, so starting today, starting today and going to mid-October, Scribblers is on sale. It's a buy one, get one. It is an amazing resource. No matter how old your children are, there are lots of activities that your whole family can do, but every activity comes with a chart that shows you as the parent where these activities are taking you and your student as they grow and mature and learn.

So I've had hundreds of families say to me, hey, I don't have a preschooler anymore, but I'm buying scribblers 'cause I want all the charts in one place. And I would not say no to that myself. So I want to encourage you, if you've been curious about scribblers, but hesitant for whatever reason, this is your moment.

This is the opportune moment. Buy one, get one is an awesome opportunities for families to share this. And if you're like me, I have multiple young moms that I would like to share this with. And this is a great build my Christmas list and check it off opportunity for scribblers.

Amy, you mentioned that your grandchildren are loving the activities. - They do. And Lisa, that is great because I gave both of these to, I bought two for my daughters-in-law because it's just so wonderful to be able to have a resource like this because not only you have activities, which are really fun and they've designed them in ways that you can just, like I just did, just get a towel and a butter knife and you're good to go, right?

But also those charts, and even if you're not in the challenge world yet, but they educate you so well. Like they have all that with the English grammar. I was referring to that the other day and I thought, man, this is so rich because just repair you as an adult, as the educator of your home that you can go, okay, I need to learn that part of speech or the arithmetic part.

They have so many cool activities that incorporate higher level thinking about math that I would never go flipping through a book for that, but it's right here. That's what I like about it. - It's right there. - It's already designed for you to, it's like your own curriculum. - Yeah, it really is.

It really is. The basics of what you need to know about all of these subjects kind of in an orderly fashion, from simple concepts to more complex concepts that you will really sink your teeth into as you learn. I love that, I love that. Well, so we encourage you guys to check out Scribblers, and we encourage you to put on your wonder hat and go out and find the wonder that God is using to woo you and your family to himself.

If your family is looking for another occasion to think heady thoughts or to talk about good books, I have a reminder for you. There is a Words Aptly Spoken book club that's led by Classical Conversations founder, Lee Borton. You could join weekly this book club. It's hosted online. And every week the meeting centers around a new book.

So some are exclusives like selections from the Copper Lodge Library. It's also literary classics like Tom Sawyer or C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity. There's some really good thought-provoking conversations. Sometimes you just need somebody else to prime the pump of your deep thinking or somebody else to encourage you to grab a book you've always been curious about but never really dipped all the way into.

Words Aptly Spoken book club is probably for you. Visit leebortons.com and you can find the link to join the live Words Aptly Spoken book club. So that's leebortons.com, okay? Amy, thank you so much for chasing wonder again with me today. This has been fun. - Oh, it's just been so delightful, always.

So thank you, Lisa. It's been fun. - Yeah, families go and be everyday educators with your family and get to know the world that God has planned for you to draw you to himself. I'll see you guys next week. (gentle music) (music fades)